Search

Couch hopping is a significant feature of youth homelessness in the United States. Every year, half of youth ages 18 to 25 who experience housing instability report couch hopping--also known as couch surfing or doubling up. Emerging work suggests that in some intergenerational informal hosting arrangements, youth and their adult hosts can form meaningful and supportive relationships. However, hosts also navigate material challenges that could threaten the stability of these arrangements. Based on in-depth interviews with nine youth ages 17 to 23 in informal hosting arrangements and 10 informal hosts, we describe how increased household costs and lease and benefits restrictions can impact stability, and the strategies hosts and youth mobilized to address them. We place hosts' instability in the context of intergenerational poverty and structural racism, reframing material challenges as opportunities to strengthen the village of support youth need to make sustained exits from homelessness.

Couch hopping is a significant feature of youth homelessness in the United States. Every year, half of youth ages 18 to 25 who experience housing instability report couch hopping—also known as couch surfing or doubling up. Emerging work suggests that in some intergenerational informal hosting arrangements, youth and their adult hosts can form meaningful and supportive relationships. However, hosts also navigate material challenges that could threaten the stability of these arrangements. Based on in-depth interviews with nine youth ages 17 to 23 in informal hosting arrangements and 10 informal hosts, we describe how increased household costs and lease and benefits restrictions can impact stability, and the strategies hosts and youth mobilized to address them. We place hosts' instability in the context of intergenerational poverty and structural racism, reframing material challenges as opportunities to strengthen the village of support youth need to make sustained exits from homelessness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This qualitative study of 19 long-term foster carers examined how they coped with traumatic events with children in their care and continued to foster children. Phenomenological methods revealed that they endured significant traumatic events regarding the children that had lasting impacts on them. While much of the related research focuses on indirect secondary trauma among foster parents, these incidents were experienced and interpreted more as primary trauma. Participants also reported an intense commitment to the children in their homes, a passion for providing a good home for them, and recognized that they benefitted personally from fostering children. Recommendations include solutions more closely aligned with primary trauma and a using veteran foster parents to support and mentor new carers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents early descriptive findings on youths and their experiences in the first 12 to 18 months after leaving foster care as part of the state of Wisconsin's Foster Youth Transitions to Adulthood Study. Findings suggest that the transition to independence is a difficult time for youth leaving the out-of-home care system. (Author/SD)